Nostalgia(For Writers Island)

I was born and I grew up in one of my homeland’s scattered islands, in the heart of the Philippine Archipelago. Our country is embraced by the sea; if God is the ocean, then He must have loved the Filipinos so much. We are constantly caressed by the sea waves come high tide or low tide, the ocean enfolds us. We are generously showered by God’s salty kisses.

Rare pearls of south sea

Strewn on far off shores

Conspicuous gems.

(From my Filipino Immigration, Haiku Series #5)

The beach is one thing I miss about home ~ my walks in the sea shores, the brine touching my skin, the sand tickling the soles of my feet, the view of the open sea’s apparent horizon nourishing my dreams. I am now here ”beyond that horizon,” which I just used to watch in my walks in the strands.

Sometimes, you will never really know and understand a thing until you stay away from it. I now undertand better what I love about my country, and what I miss about home. The sea is one of them.

My earliest memory of the sea are the mangroves. These dense thickest along the rivers and the tidal shores was my first view of the sea. We live in the inland, so before I saw the endless emerald green seas under the azure skies, my young eyes was already captured by this mystical greens that lined the coasts and the river banks. There is something in their verdancy that transport me back in time.

Mangroves are time machines of my nostalgia for simplier, uncomplicated life of childhood. It brings me back to the summer of my youth, of my first boat ride, of fishing, of hunting, of swimming in the pristine river brine. My happy thoughts and bitter-sweet longing for my first sunburn.

Photographs from my recent home-coming to the Philippines.

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The Sea, You and Me

I’ve seen how everything are connected

That somehow we are one ~ interrelated.

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As I tread the sands stretching to the sea,

And my size is engulfed by its infinity,

I watch in great wonder how God links things.

And How God connected you to me~

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The seawaves gently kissing the seashores.

The shore that’s bed to the infinite sands.

The sand that reaches the roads, that lead me home.

The home inside my heart where you belong.

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You are safe in my heart you are home now.

Today, as you open the doors, streets you will see.

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Walk the streets, it will lead you to me.

The many winding roads take you somewhere,

To the beach, maybe.

The beach where the sands are gathered

Forming the fine strands kissed by the sea.

The sea that stretches reaching me here.

The enormous sea that links you to me.

Thinking of the sea, painting the mangroves, feeding my nostalgia. When shall the salty sea-breeze of home ever kiss me again?

26 responses

O help this is gorgeous! And to feel some bitter-sweet longing for sunburn is really the ultimate! But i know what you mean exactly! I long for the island of Tasmania, even though I only lived there for 2 years and it was a place of heartbreak! And yet,all I know now is how the beauty of the place is so much a part of me! It will always be my soul place!

i know that you have a mixed-feeling regarding your homecoming but i guess you still had smiles in your face during those times. now, you take me back to an island i dream of going again. ill be home this 1st week of march to celebrate my mom’s bday hehe.

it is the sea where i live.. you have spoken so beautifully of home.. we can take it with us..yes… i too have always lived by the sea… thank you it is beautiful… and the mangroves painting awesome… it reminds me of the northwest tides of Western Oz.. the far far outgoing tides and the mussy mud between my toes….

jeques, i like that one photo with the bead necklaces are. you have framed it excellent. this is one of a kind. this is such a happy recollections of your homecoming. wow, the sight of Boracay is just breath taking. such a pefect combination of photographs with poetry. you did it well.

Boracay inspired so much poetry and artworks in me. Perhaps I inhabit that island in my past life.

The picture with trinkets is also one of my favorites such a nice contrat. – I have another picture somewhere with a bike instead of the trinkets. I forgot where I posted it though. I think in my post: As I travel on.

Self-Portrait Photographs

We travel the world to explore, to see things, to study, to claim the many titles that would prove our learnings, but fail to realize that we have something within us a very interesting subject that's uncharted, undefined.

How could we live such estrangement with the person within us?

More than viewing our reflections in the mirror, we need to look through our eyes to see and understand the soul that resides in our hearts.

Self-portrait photography is a metaphor to seeing beyond what's visible.